NY Gov. Cuomo faces tough second act

Gov. Andrew Cuomo makes his second State of the State speech Wednesday and faces a bigger challenge than his catalog of political wins in Year One. It’s called Year Two.

Writing the script for a second act that will carry over the momentum of a big opening can be daunting.

“You set the bar high when you have a lot of accomplishments in your first year, so it sets a lot of expectations for the second year,” said Republican adviser David Catalfamo, a top aide to Republican Gov. George Pataki, who cut spending, slashed bureaucracy and cut taxes in his first two years. Like Pataki, Cuomo sold New Yorkers on a promise of deliverance from government dysfunction and economic pain.

Cuomo, a Democrat, says he even surprised himself by accomplishing most of his four-year legislative agenda in one year. It included cuts in state spending, legalizing gay marriage, capping the growth in some of the nation’s highest property taxes, and a small but rare middle-class tax cut in December as part of a deal for a millionaire’s tax.

“What makes Andrew Cuomo’s first year unique was the accomplishments and the ability to have as strong a favorability rating with voters at the end of the first year as he did at the beginning of the first year,” said Steven Greenberg of the Siena College poll.

That gives Cuomo a critical advantage going into a second year over Pataki — who faced a mostly Democratic state and a bitter Democratic Assembly majority.

Cuomo said his second-year agenda will focus on making government and schools more efficient, creating jobs, reducing expensive mandates and carrying out the legislative wins of last year. He isn’t hinting about any eye-catching proposals, but the State of the State is the best venue for governors’ biggest pitches.

“The functioning of government is important,” Cuomo told The Associated Press on Monday. “Somehow we lost the focus on that.”

Although speeding up the lines at the DMV seems an unlikely priority for a rising political star whose name is already mentioned among presidential candidates for 2016, it’s part of a critical and difficult task for New York and his own ambitions.

“What he has done takes a huge effort to start, and a bigger effort to sustain,” said Robert Bellafiore, the primary staffer on Pataki’s second State of the State address.

And that might be enough.

“All he has to do is continue to bridge the partisan gap, run the state while other states are collapsing financially,” said Hank Sheinkopf, a top political strategist who worked for the Clinton administration, where Cuomo was housing secretary. “He doesn’t have to do magic tricks.”

“Everyone is paying attention to what Andrew Cuomo does because Andrew Cuomo is a national star,” Sheinkopf said.

Cuomo has already put off more heated issues until after the speech, such as whether to allow drilling into upstate shale for natural gas, a process environmental groups consider hazardous. He said he’s awaiting further study. And he’s given little attention to a top campaign promise of creating voluntary public financing of campaigns. Good-government groups say the lack of public financing has long fostered corruption in Albany and its so-called pay-to-play culture. Cuomo’s idea to approve private sector casinos will require a lengthy constitutional amendment, but will also likely have a spot in the speech.